Each course is offered at least once over a two-year period, allowing a student to obtain the full complement of required and elective courses. Courses which are used by other degree programs at EMU are offered more frequently.

Fall and winter online courses are offered on a semester basis (15 weeks), while spring online courses are offered on a term basis (8 weeks). The fall semester runs from September through December, the winter semester from January through April, and the spring term from May through June.

Most students register for two courses per semester and one course during a Spring/Summer term. Since a term is half as long as a semester but the course content and requirements remain the same, some consider the accelerated pace too burdensome to carry two courses simultaneously. In either case, the final decision is dependent on one’s personal and professional responsibilities.

All assignments and tests are submitted online through the Internet course using various tools such as document sharing, threaded discussion, chat rooms, and e-mail attachment. These tools are all provided as a result of registering for an online course. When assigned to online, team-based learning activities, students will correspond with fellow team members using the same tools. Professors, in turn, respond to online submissions the same way.

Whether or not the research data is proprietary determines the primary difference between a development project and a thesis. Since most of the students in the program are employed in business or industry and conduct their graduate research in conjunction with their job, they choose to complete a development project because of the proprietary nature of their research. Finished development projects are housed in the Quality program office. A thesis, on the other hand, is housed in EMU’s library, is archived in an international database, and becomes public domain. A development project is equivalent to four graduate credits and exclusively under the jurisdiction of the Masters of Science in Technology Studies faculty. A thesis is equivalent to six graduate credits but is also under the jurisdiction of the Graduate School, for which the Graduate School imposes additional requirements.

Conditional admission is reserved for students who do not meet the minimum academic requirements for admission (2.5 undergraduate GPA). Under the supervision of a Masters of Science in Technology Studies faculty member, a student is given an opportunity to become admissible by successfully completing twelve, graduate-credit hours of Masters of Science in Technology Studies coursework and attaining no less than a B grade in each course.

Yes, a student may register for courses through EMU’s Continuing Education by going to: www.emuonline.edu. This will give the student an opportunity to experience an online Masters of Science in Technology Studies course. The student may then decide to apply for graduate admission and apply the course to the Masters of Science in Technology Studies degree.

The amount of time to be admitted to the program depends on how long it takes all of the required documentation including, official transcripts of all undergraduate and graduate coursework, to reach EMU; that varies by institutions sending these documents. If EMU receives transcripts within several weeks of a student’s application for admission, it could be as early as several additional weeks. You may, however, register for a course through EMU’s Continuing Education while your graduate application is being processed by going to: www.emuonline.edu.